Vegan MOFO - Day 9: Another 'chicken' salad.

SO, on gym days I usually prepare a salad for dinner - purely because I don't see the point in ruining the sweat and tears I produced just hours earlier on an oily meal.
Fake chicken and salad are one of my favourite combos, and the best part is you can use whatever is in the fridge, and whatever dressing you have on hand to change it up

Salad should feed 4 people comfortably

I used:
1 cup of 4 bean mix
1 cup of sweet corn kernels
a cup of cucumber, diced into bite sized chunks
1 cup of salad greens (I used chopped cabbage)
1/2 cup of shredded carrot
1/2 cup of shredded beetroot

1/2 cup of onion - red or spring onions chopped
1 cup of avocado, diced

fake chicken strips - cooked (i used about 1 cup)

Dressing of choice.


Throw in a large bowl. Top with dressing. DONE OMG!

Vegan MOFO - Day 8: Tempeh BBQ ribs/steak

Apart from marinading, this is actually quite a quick protein to cook. would go great served alongside some salad, or even sliced differently and cooked on skewers as a kebab. I'm not a huge fan of tempeh, but this did win me over. You could also use other marinades apart from BBQ.

You will need:
BBQ sauce, enough to cover tempeh (I used premade, but you can make your own)
a container which fits the tempeh in it snugly. (Too big and you're wasting BBQ sauce)
Tempeh.

Slice tempeh into slabs which are no more than 1cm fat. The thinner they are, the more marinated they will become. You can cut them into whatever shape you like after this, but I stuck with uniform pieces.
Place a small layer of BBQ sauce in the container, and then layer in your tempeh (BBQ sauce, tempeh, BBQ sauce, tempeh etc) until you are out of both.

Place in fridge to marinate overnight (the longer the better)

When ready to cook take out of container, and cook on hot grill until the bbq sauce starts to caramelize.

Serve

Vegan MOFO - Day 7: Spinach Cob Loaf Dip

This recipe is great for any kind of social gatherings, and can be made in advance and kept in the fridge. Although I would not place dip in the loaf until it is ready to be served.
This is exactly how I remember the non-vegan version tasting, only much better for you, and much better for the animals!

You will need
1 cob loaf

Spinach Dip:
1 cup of silken firm tofu
1/4 cup of vegan mayonnaise
1/4 cup of finely diced shallots
1 cup of frozen chopped spinach, thawed and squeezed of excess liquid
1 tablespoon of apple cider vinegar
1 teaspoon of salt
2-3 tablespoons of vegetable stock powder. (more if you think it needs it)

To make dip, place tofu, mayonnaise, vinegar, salt and vegetable stock powder in food processor, blend until smooth
add shallots and spinach and leave in fridge until ready.

Hollow out cob loaf into bite sized pieces and place in oven until slightly crisp
I also like to place the hollowed cob loaf in the oven for a few minutes to crisp up

Place dip inside hollow cob loaf and serve alongside bite size pieces of bread.
Enjoy

Vegan MOFO - Day 6: Bounty Chocolate Bar

The best part of this is you can tweak the recipe to however you want it, and know exactly what's going into your chocolate bar. Not very hard although the recipe makes it look difficult. You'll be making more chocolate bars in the future just because they're so simple but tasty :)


Coconut filling:
1 can(cup) coconut cream
2 1/2 cups of shredded coconut
3 tablespoons of vanilla essence
1/3 cup of vegan butter (I used nuttelex) or coconut oil
1/4 cup of raw sugar (or sweetner of choice, ie maple syrup or agave)
3 tablespoons of xantham gum (or cornflour, or thickening agent)

1 bar of dark cooking chocolate, for melting

melt butter or oil over medium-high heat in a pan until melted
add sugar and cook until melted into the mixture (a few minutes)
Add coconut cream and cook until boiling - at this point add in the vanilla essence and take off the heat.


add shredded coconut and xantham gum
At this point, the mix should be very thick, if it still seems rather gooey, add more shredded coconut.

firmly pack coconut mixture into a square or rectangle container and place in fridge for 3 hours to set
gently cut into the coconut mix and cut it into smaller rectangles. These will be your bars.
place in freezer to set completely for an hour or so.

take out of freezer after an hour or so, break out each piece of coconut bar, if it is too thick, cut in half again, they are very rich when coated in chocolate.  Place pre-cut bars back into the freezer while you melt your chocolate.


You can melt your chocolate a few ways, if you have a microwave, you can use that.
I placed a mixing bowl over a pan of boiling water and kept mixing my chunks of cooking chocolate until it was melted and no clumps remained.


Now - for the fun part, coating your bars in chocolate!

I found he easiest way to do this was skewering each bar with a toothpick - this gives you something to hold onto while you coat them evenly in chocolate, but you have to work quickly, as the coconut hits room temperature it will not be solid enough for the toothpick to hold it up.


I used a silicone spatula to dump melted chocolate onto each coconut bar, and then gently scraped the excess off back into the bowl, making sure each side is covered (you will get the hang of this quite quickly) and then placed each bar onto heavy duty aluminum foil (baking paper would work) to set.
you can put them in the fridge to speed this up.

And then, you're done.

Vegan MOFO - Day 5: Cashew Curry

So, this was surprisingly easy, and Mr Monster can't stop raving about it :)

You can really add whatever vegetables you want to it!

Cashew Curry sauce:

1/2 cup of raw cashews
1/2 cup of coconut cream
4 tablespoons of red curry paste
4 tablespoons of curry powder
1/2 cup of diced tomatoes
3 cloves of garlic
1/4 cup of water + 2 teaspoons of vegetable stock powder added.

Blend all ingredients until smooth in a food processor - yes, it's really that easy!

For the vegetables I used:
2 potatoes, cut into chunks
2 carrots, cut into chunks
1/2 cup of corn kernels
4 cups of loose spinach
1 large broccoli, cut into florets
1 cup of chickpeas (pre soaked or tinned)
1 large onion, diced
3 cloves of garlic, diced

1 tablespoon of red curry paste
1 tablespoon of curry powder

Gently par-boil carrot and potato until almost cooked (still firm) take off the heat and add broccoli for 5 minutes until also slightly cooked.
Place onion, garlic, and curry paste/powder into a frying pan with oil, cook until onion is translucent and curry is fragrant

add par-boiled vegetables, corn and chickpeas, stir well to combine.
Add sauce, and cook through for about 10-15 minutes.
Once sauce is heated through, add spinach and cook until wilted.

Serve with rice.

Vegan MOFO - Day 4: "Chicken" salad

This is really a quick throw together meal that I make for me and Mr. Monster when I'm too busy at the gym.

4 loose cups of fresh spinach, washed
1 packet of frys chicken strips
1/2 red onion, sliced
1/2 cup of cherry tomatoes, cut in half
1 large avocado, sliced
1/2 cup mushrooms, sliced
1 cup of shredded carrot and beetroot
1/4 cup of chargrilled capsicum, eggplant, or semi dried tomatoes (tinned/canned)

Dressing of your choice - in this case I used 99% fat free Praise mayo, but a spicy peri sauce would be nice too

throw everything but the dressing and "chicken" in a bowl and toss
fry chicken on medium heat until cooked
add chicken to salad, and top with dressing - voila.

I know - I'm lazy sometimes, but it was delish!

Vegan MOFO - Day 3: Samosas

This recipe is so easy to mix up. My advice is to change it up, try new things with it. You can always mix up the filling depending on what's in your fridge, and the pastry based on how much effort you want to put into making them.

Filling:
2 cups of mashed potato (sweet or normal or a mix of both is fine)
1 cups of varied vegetables (whatever you have in the fridge) I used, carrot, peas and corn
1 large onion, diced
2 cloves of garlic, diced
3 tablespoons of curry powder
4 tablespoons of oil

Place a pan over medium heat, add oil, onion, garlic, fry until the onion starts to go translucent and then add curry powder, cook until fragrant.
Add varied vegetables and cook for a minute, and then add mashed potato.
mix through and cook for another minute.
Set aside

Pastry:
1 cup plain flour
2 tsp salt
2 tb vegetable oil
1/3 - 1/2 cup warm water.

Preheat oven to 180C (or preheat oil if you want to deep fry them)
Mix flour and salt into a bowl. Make a well in the center, add the oil and enough water to make a firm dough. Knead the dough on a floured surface until smooth and roll into a ball. Cover in plastic wrap and set aside at room temperature for 30 minutes.
Divide the pastry into 12 equal pieces. Roll each piece into a ball and roll out into a circle of 15 cm. Divide this circle into two equal pieces with a knife.
Brush each edge with a little water and form a cone shape around your fingers, sealing the dampened edge.
Fill the cases with a tablespoon of filling and press the two dampened edges together to seal the top of the cone.

There are a few different ways to cook these. I baked mine, but you can also deep fry them!
If you are too lazy to make the pastry on your own (like I am at times) buy some vegan puff pastry and use that, it will work. I'm not 100% about whether the puff would go too well in the deep fry though.